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Dear my mentor, Izetbegovic 1

Beside my dad, I don’t think that I ever had a living mentor, even the word mentor never came to my mind until I had to describe their influence on my way of thinking. Of those that I’m proud to call my mentors are Alija Ali Izetbegovic, Abu Hamid Al Ghazali and Malik ben Nabi. Why these among millions and millions of scholars and thinkers, I only can say that this is the well of God.

My dear mentor Alija Ali Izetbegovic,

I recall that one day you said in your book “Notes from prison”, that the blue sky in day light is beautiful, why do we need the night with its darkness? Then after thinking you said, we need the darkness in order to see the beautiful lightening stars. I always smile whenever I remember this, as a big admirer and fan of art, I’m always fascinated with such expressions but at the same time it draws my attention to why we as humans have a dark side too!

Each one of us has his good and bad, his ups and downs and that’s a bless in a sense that we tend to value and maintain high standards and morals. We tend to be perfectionists and idealists all the time and the result is becoming more disappointed and depressed of this imperfect and immoral world. However, in your book “Islam between East and West” you explained how our imperfection is perfection in its own. We are not angles who don’t makes mistakes all the time, and we are not daemons that do mistakes all the time but we are humans who do right and wrong and align with our nature of making mistakes and pursuing doing the right thing all the time.

However my mentor, trying to do the right thing all the time is really tiring, you end up caught up in the middle between your nagging never-stop-hyper-thinking super ego as Freud discussed, and your desires and needs (Id) and this poor ego -that is trying to please both sides and accommodate both of them- is thinking to kill himself. I reached to a conclusion my mentor that achieving balance between both of these is a mission impossible, to balance this inner and outer aspects of yourself your identity is rather complicated than a thing that goes with my nature. Nonetheless, the integration between these two is what makes me human. A human being who do mistakes along the way and try to purify himself as well in the same passion. A human being who accepts himself with all his odds and hence accept others as they are the same as he is. A human being who is less judgmental, more understanding and have empathy for everyone around.

Auguste Perret once said “Architecture is what makes the ruins beautiful”! as a man of choice, you choose what to see and what truth to believe, ruins for some are only ruins but for others what gives this dead thing a meaning is Architecture. How we choose to interpret our surrounding is what makes us humans. Any act that tries dehumanizing me by telling me this is the truth without allowing me to think about it is inhuman. Standing for my opinions and taking responsibilities of my actions is what makes me human; any act that tries to free me from this obligation towards myself and others and prevents me from struggling to stand for my own responsibilities is inhuman even if the intention was for the good of me.

But my mentor, what gives this struggle a meaning, what makes the actions of these humans who are contesting this world order a value? In today’s context, anything that is not rewarding or done out of interest is considered a failure, a big one. Those who are on hunger strike inside prisons like Shaikh Khader Adnan, what do they gain besides their own suffering and health issues, a couple of hash tags and profile pictures change on social media? If you asked them, they will always say I will do it again and again and again! What makes this guy raise his voice in solidarity with someone somewhere else in the world that might never gonna be heard stand with a big smile on his face, Alone!! Drama is what makes us humans!